Nephrology Clinical Research Center (NCRC)

Mission
To conduct clinical trials for treatment, cure or prevention of kidney
disease and conditions related to kidney disease
To train and support physicians and other health care providers
affiliated with the Division of Nephrology

The Nephrology Clinical Research Center (NCRC), within the University
of Virginia Division of Nephrology, conducts clinical trials with
potential to benefit patients with kidney disease and kidney-related
problems.

What is a clinical trial?

A clinical trial is a study conducted with patients, usually to
evaluate a new treatment or method of treatment.

Each study is designed to answer scientific questions and to find
new and better ways to help patients. The search for good treatments
begins with basic research in the laboratory and animal studies. The
best results of that research are tried in patient studies, hopefully
leading to findings that may help many people.

Before a new treatment is tried with patients, it is carefully
studied in the laboratory. This research points out the new methods
most likely to succeed, and, as much as possible, shows how to use them
safely and effectively. But this early research cannot predict exactly
how a new treatment will work with patients.

With any new treatment there may be risks as well as possible
benefits. There may also be some risks that are not yet known. Clinical
trials help us find out if a promising new treatment is safe and
effective for patients. During a trial, more and more information is
gained about a new treatment, its risks, and how well it may or may not
work.

Standard treatments, the ones now being used, are often the base for
building new, hopefully better treatments. Many new treatments are
designed on the basis of what has worked in the past, in efforts to
improve on this.

Only patients who wish to participate, and volunteer, take part in a
clinical trial. You may be interested in or asked to enter a trial.
Learn as much as you can about the trial, before you make up your
mind.

Why would I be interested?

The patients in a clinical trial are among the first to receive new
research treatments before they are widely available. How a treatment
will work for a patient in a trial can't be known ahead of time. Even
standard treatments, although effective in many patients, do not carry
sure benefits for everyone. But, patients should choose if they want to
take part in a study or not only after they understand both the
possible risks and benefits.

The patients in a clinical trial are among the first to receive new
research treatments before they are widely available. How a treatment
will work for a patient in a trial can be predicted, but can't be known
for sure ahead of time. Even standard treatments, although effective in
many patients, do not carry sure benefits for everyone. In addition, it
has been shown that patients participating in a trial frequently have
better outcomes, regardless of whether they receive the active agent or
placebo (“sugar pill” ), the so called “placebo effect” of trials. But,
patients should choose if they want to take part in a study or not,
only after they understand both the possible risks and benefits.

Patients who take part in clinical trial procedures that do prove to
be better treatments have the first chance to benefit from them. All
patients in clinical trials are carefully monitored during the trial
and followed up afterwards. They frequently become part of a network of
clinical trials carried out around the country. In this network,
doctors and researchers pool their ideas and experience to design and
monitor clinical studies. They share their knowledge from many
specialties about treatment and care. Patients in these studies
receive the benefit of their expertise.

Based on what researchers learn from laboratory studies, and
sometimes earlier clinical studies and standard treatments as well,
they design a trial to see if a new treatment will improve on current
treatments. The hope is that it will. Often researchers use standard
treatments as the building blocks to try to design better
treatments.